


Bad Dream Rising

by orphan_account



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-18
Updated: 2015-03-18
Packaged: 2018-03-18 13:09:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3570794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Templar Captain Finley Leach stumbles into the clutches of a Desire Demon while on a brief campaign with some of the Inquisition's finest. Only Cole can rescue him from the creature's foul intentions.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bad Dream Rising

            He woke up with nothing. No sword or shield on his back, no armor to comfort with its familiar weight. There was snow in his hands. White, and his hands went pink—then red—from gripping it. Senses, Finley, come to your senses.

            He shook and coughed, rising to his feet. Bare in the snow, dusk on the mountainous horizon, Finley Leach cried out. The cold bit into his flesh. His eyes watered from the white all around.

            “Where am I?!” The only response was the echo of his own words across the peaks. “Help! Help me!!”

            A pair of heavy, warm hands closed his eyes. The long fingers caressed his cheek, and there was the nudge of a nose against the back of his ear. “Shh,” came the murmur. “I have you. You are safe.”

            “What… what’s going on? I…” The shivering ceased, as if not seeing the winter made is dissipate. Finley curled his toes into grass, his fingers coming out of numbness, stinging so much less now.

            “You don’t have to worry anymore. You can’t be alone if I’m with you.” The hands shifted, but Finley’s eyelids were heavy. Arms snaked down his shoulders, then around his torso into embrace. “ _All alone, the echoing of silence, empty hands, nothing to stand on, unstable, selfless. If the tide came in, who would pull me out?_ Let me pull you out of the water. I’m here. Let me help. _I love to help_.” Fingers were drawn up the center of Finley’s chest, stopping at the base of the throat.

            Finley shivered, his feet tensing and breath growing short. He felt himself surrender to the caress, all his Templar pride melting to this illusionary touch.

“No!”

            Cole staggered up. He clenched his hand around the hilt of his broken dagger until it drew blood. Before him, Captain Finley Leach sat on his knees, head in the lap of a Desire demon. She cooed and petted her perfect doll, her lips hovering over his eyes, her tail flicking over his arms. “Let him go! You can’t do that to him!”

            “Oh, Compassion… How sweet that you think you can help him.” She kissed Leach’s bloody forehead. “An agony like this can be filled only with sins. Nothing you can do would ever help him. You do want him to be helped, don’t you Cole?”

            “Stop talking!” Cole huffed and struggled forward, attempting to correct his footing. Everything hurt. A fragile, human body, a crumbling liability, and a barrier to all the works he wished to perform to help others. A wall between him and saving this man. “Lies can’t make him feel better! You’re only hurting him; it isn’t the same as me.”

            It laughed at Cole. Golden eyes settled on the spirit, ripe with hunger and greed. “If this is something that can be stopped, come and stop it.” She pressed her lips onto Finley’s.

            “Don't!!”

            The desire demon feasted upon his soul, replacing his humanity with her own essence. Finley sputtered and gasped, his hands grabbing at the air, finding nothing. Yet his expression remained at contentment, an odd joy fluttering at the edge of his foggy eyes. Before Cole could make his lunge, the creature had dissipated and it was too late. “Finley, no! Wake up!”

            He grabbed the sides of the templar’s face and shook. Cole felt his heart raging in his chest. “ _The heat seeping in, everywhere, silken cloth around my neck, can’t breathe, why breathe, don’t want to breathe, more of it. Tie my wrists, fill me; I’m not better unless I’m forced better. Tear me apart to make me something better, I just want to say the words, surrender_ …”

            Cole wiped his eyes then struck Finley across the face. “You must not listen to her! That won’t fix anything! You aren’t broken; it’s only the way you’re looking at it now.” Leach twitched, head rolling back, coughing. “Open your eyes. Open your eyes so you can see this isn’t what you want.”

“Cole.”

            The Templar felt the dizziness take him, dipping him to the side. He crashed into the bed, but wasn’t sure of much more with the blindfold on. Finley tugged on his wrist-ties, shaking the headboard. But there was a fantastic grip rising on him from the hips to the chest. He panted. “C-can’t I just s-see you?”

            “That’s not part of the game,” was whispered in his ear, the steamy breath curling up into his messy hair. “Come on, Finley; play nice?” A giggle, and a rough tug on his curly locks. The man groaned.

            _It feels good, but it isn’t good. This hurts more in the end, breaking the heart, the mind, stealing the body. Fight back or she wins. Fight back or you never win again._

“I… I’m ready to stop, now. Come on, Cole; I’m ready to quit.”

            “That isn’t part of the game, either, Finley.”

            The man pulled away from the heavenly touch, rubbing his face against the headboard, trying to get the blindfold off. “I said I’m done! Let me out!” He thrashed.

            “Stop that! Don’t you want to feel better?”

“That’s it, Finley. You can make it.”

            But Cassandra was already rising. Somewhere behind her, the Inquisitor also awakened, spitting out the filth of sand and demon blood. “What’s happened?!” the Seeker demanded. “Where is… Captain Leach!”

            Cole shuffled back, still holding the Templar’s head. “The demon’s inside him, but he’s fighting! He can make it!”

            “What?!” Her blade seemed to leap into her hand. “He’s already an abomination! Move away, Cole!” She tried to kick him off of the man, but he only shoved back and tried to drag Finley farther away. “This is no joking matter! Would you prefer he die possessed?!”

            “He can make it!” Cole shook Leach hard, the man’s bloody head clunking against the ground. “Please fight back! You’re almost there! _Tearing the silk, pulling against its pull, I feel cold again. I don’t want the winter back, I can’t go back to emptiness, the wind nipping, stinging me, choking the wrong way, eating me alive._ But if you don’t fight back, she’ll eat you anyways! Even if it hurts now, you can make it. Take a deep breath. Open your eyes!”

            “That’s enough, Cole!” The spirit pulled the man away from Cassandra again, crying out in his own agony. Knees weren’t supposed to feel like that. Shoulders were not intended to ache this much. “He has to die now! Before his soul is gone!”

            He looked at the Inquisitor with big, fearful eyes. He couldn’t stop Cassandra’s advances forever. _Just stop her! Just for this moment, stop her from taking Finley away!_

            “Finley, please!” Cole swallowed. “Please open your eyes! _Look at me_!”

            “Stop putting this off! He—“

            Leach gasped for air, a man surfacing from the water after so many ageless moments of drifting. The desire demon, screeching, materialized from his exhale. She flopped to the ground, crawling away, digging her claws into sand and stone but getting almost nowhere.

            “No! I had him! He had everything he could have wanted! You little fuck! You pathetic shit!” She screeched again, the seeker’s blade piercing her horned skull, the Inquisitor’s anchor raging to send her back through the veil in pieces.

            Captain Finley Leach’s hand trembled as it rose to caress Cole’s gaunt cheek. The spirit held his fingers there. “It’s real,” he coaxed. “ _So like a dream. So similar to illusion. How would I know if you’re real? How can I know if you’re lying? What are you?”_ Cole brushed his thumb over Finley’s palm. “I’m Cole.”

            Finley swallowed hard and smiled. His voice wavered and squeaked. “Y-yes… Yes you are.” Pinpricks of tears skewed his vision, and before he could wipe them away himself, Cole had taken them away with the inside edge of his sleeve.

**Author's Note:**

> Finley Leach is the Oc of my lovely girlfriend, Sincerely_Harbinger. This was written as a gift to her, for being my one and only perfect sweetheart.


End file.
